Tulips are flowers that are popular all over the world. Their bewitching beauty attracts many people. Therefore, they are grown in various countries. A description of this crop, tips for growing and general recommendations for caring for it can be found in this article.
General information
Tulips belong to the Liliaceae family. These perennial bulbous plants get their name from the Persian word for turban. The fact is that the shape of the buds of these flowers is very similar to an oriental headdress resembling a turban.
Tulip flowers have been growing since ancient times in Central Asia: in the steppes, deserts, mountainous regions. They can also be found in the southern regions of Kazakhstan and Eastern Europe. Turkey, Iran and India are currently growing tulips.
Flower Description
Depending on the variety in question, the height of the plant can be 10-20 or 65-100 cm.
The culture stem consists of several parts. These include the donce, stolon, as well as the generativeshoot on which leaves and buds are formed. The peduncle has a cylindrical shape and is either 5-20 or 85-100 cm high. The stem stands straight and does not bend down to the ground.
Tulip leaves are green or bluish. They are elongated, their edges can be smooth and wavy, covered with a slight coating of wax. The venation of this culture is arcuate. The leaves are arranged in such a way that they surround the entire stem. The highest flag leaf is the smallest.
One-flowered varieties of tulips are most common. However, in some varieties, 3-5 buds can form on the peduncle. The perianth is formed by six free leaves, the same number of stamens in tulips. Although there are varieties of various shades, the most popular are yellow and red tulips. Their coloring can be represented by a pure color or combine several tones at once.
Often the lower part of the buds has a different color from the rest of the petals, which can form the so-called "bottom" of the tulip.
The shape of flowers is in the form of a glass, a bowl or a lily. They are large, reach a length of 12 cm, their diameter is from 3 to 10 cm, when opened - about 20 cm. The buds open in sunny weather, and on cloudy days and at night the petals are collected.
The fruit of the crop is represented by a small trihedral box containing flat yellow-brown seeds.
Tulips in the greenhouse
Very often people givepreference for growing tulips in a greenhouse. First, it's not very difficult. The most important thing is to know how to do it right. Secondly, greenhouses work all year round. And this means that you can grow tulips by March 8 or any other holiday.
In order for the flowers to be beautiful and strong, it is necessary to select high-quality planting material and properly prepare it. Bulbs can be purchased at speci alty stores or from other growers. The best time to buy them is from mid-summer to September.
Experts say that the sooner you buy the bulbs, the better they will be. How to choose a good planting material:
- If the scales of the bulb are very dense, painted in a dark brown hue, then it was overexposed in the soil.
- Carefully inspect the bulb for damage and mold, they should not be.
- It is best to give preference to heads whose diameter is about 3.5-4 cm.
- On the dense bottom of a he althy head there are only small tubercles, from which roots will subsequently sprout.
- If the size of the bulb seems too light, then it is rotten.
How to prepare bulbs for planting
Planting material can be bought at the store. But for those who have been growing tulips in a greenhouse for a long time, it is not difficult to prepare the bulbs for planting on their own.
To get the buds in early spring, for the first holiday of this season, shouldtake care of summer:
- First you need to choose the most attractive-looking plants, with no signs of wilting, disease, and mark them. He althy flowers have no dashes, spots, dots on the petals. Their color should be characteristic of this plant variety. If, due to inexperience, let this out of sight, flowers affected by some kind of virus will not be able to reproduce over time, and it is impossible to determine from the bulbs harvested from such plants whether they are capable of this process or not.
- From marked specimens, flowers are cut on the third day after the petals bloom. The bud must fully open, otherwise, after cutting it from the plant, the leaves will not develop well.
- When the end of June comes, the bulbs need to be dug up. If the plants have not yet turned yellow, the procedure is postponed to July. There is no need to hurry, otherwise the tulips will bloom earlier. Every gardener wants to receive flowers for the holiday. To do this, you need to plant he althy bulbs. Of all dug out, the largest are selected, without damage and rot, their shape should be round.
Greenhouse planting
To get flowers for the first spring holiday, planting should begin with the onset of November. Before this, the bulbs are recommended to be disinfected:
- Soak in potassium permanganate, a weak solution is being prepared for this.
- Sprinkle with a decoction of celandine.
- Process with very warm water, but not boiling water.
The soil should also be decontaminated to eliminate the content of parasites in it. For this, the substrateplaced in the oven for 15 minutes. Usually soil for greenhouses is purchased, but if this is not possible, it is made up independently from garden soil, peat and sand. The technology for growing tulips is simple:
- Each bulb is planted in a separate container. But if there are a lot of them, boxes or containers are used for this.
- The distance between planting material should be at least 1.5 cm.
- The planting holes are shallow - three centimeters.
- The bulbs placed in them are sprinkled with earth and watered abundantly.
- The pots or container with bulbs are placed in a cool room where it is dark and damp.
- Planting is watered regularly so that the soil does not dry out. It should always be moist.
Sprouting and bud formation should be expected in about 140 days. At this time, tulips need diffused lighting and additional nutrition in order to strengthen the stems. For this plant, you need to water it with a solution of calcium nitrate.
Flowers should be transferred to the greenhouse 21 days before scheduled bloom. The sprouts have time to grow up to 5-6 cm in height. For three days, the temperature in the greenhouse is maintained at 15 ° C. When the color of the plants becomes rich green, the temperature should be raised to 19 ° C.
Care for greenhouse tulips
Features of growing a tulip and caring for this plant depend on the variety. However, there are some conditions that must be followed, regardless of their variety:
- Very importanttake care of the lighting. It should be bright, because the lack of light has a detrimental effect on the condition of the flowers. Their stems bend to the ground and twist, and the color of the petals becomes paler.
- This crop can tolerate exposure to direct sunlight. However, in this case, it is recommended to water the plant very carefully: water that gets on the leaves can cause burns.
- Further care consists in loosening the soil, weeding from weeds and watering, as needed.
- Flowers are cut when the buds have not yet opened, and their color has not become characteristic of the variety.
- Bouquets should be kept in water with a temperature of +5 °C. So the freshness of the flowers lasts longer. Water should be changed periodically.
- After cutting flowers, watering of plants is halved, this mode is maintained until they wither.
- Dry leaves are the signal for digging up the bulbs and further storage. Such planting material can be used to grow tulips in the garden. Replanting them in a greenhouse is not recommended.
Tulips in the open field
Growing these flowers outdoors is easy if you take into account every detail. Sometimes making minor mistakes results in stunted growth, stem rot, small buds, rapid wilting, and more.
The best conditions for growing tulips in the ground are flat areas in the garden. It is better if they are well lit by the sun. In the shade from the crowns of trees or buildings for household purposes, there will begrow flowers of the hardiest varieties. For growing tulips, it is desirable that the soil is fertile, light, with a neutral reaction.
Outdoor planting
Gardeners usually plant in autumn. At this time, the bulbs will undergo natural cooling, and it is in such conditions that new sprouts of future plants begin to emerge inside them, which will bloom early. Tulips are also grown from bulbs planted in spring, but these plants bloom later.
According to the recommendation of experts, around mid-September, when the soil temperature drops to 10 ° C, but frosts do not begin, you can plant tulips. In the garden, grooves or holes are made for each bulb separately. Their depth should be equal to three times the height of the planting material. If the planting is too deep, the bulbs will form few "babies".
Planting material can be placed at any distance from each other, but not closer than 10 cm, otherwise the growth of the bulbs and their digging will be difficult. After planting, the pits are covered with soil and mulched with humus or peat. No additional shelter is required for the winter.
This is acceptable for a small area. If the areas are large, which is important for the industrial cultivation of plants, the bulbs are simply laid out on the surface and covered with a layer of soil.
Caring for flowers in the garden
In the spring, after the snow melts, you need to remove the mulch and loosen the soil. After that, fertilizer containing nitrogen should be applied. Sotulips will grow better and grow green mass faster. Further care consists in loosening the soil and watering as needed.
When sprouts appear, you need to carefully examine them. If signs of disease are found, they are dug up and destroyed. Early spring is usually characterized by frosts, but tulips are not afraid of them. These flowers respond well to feeding. They need to be done when 2-3 leaves appear, before the start of the flowering and budding period. To do this, use mineral fertilizers containing phosphorus and potassium.
When flowering ends, tulip cultivation and care continues. In order for all forces to be directed to the formation of large bulbs, blossoming flowers should be removed, but the leaves on the plant should be left, otherwise there will be fewer bulbs. The stems also remain in the flower bed until they turn yellow. This is necessary for the bulbs to fully ripen.
Growing tulips at home
At home, on the windowsill, not all kinds of tulips grow. Flowers of exotic varieties, for example, are very capricious. For growing tulips at home, it is recommended to take time-tested varieties: Aristocrat, Oxford, Parade, London and others. It is preferable to choose undersized varieties. They are more unpretentious and resistant to diseases, able to endure poor care for a short time. Purchased bulbs are ready for planting. They can be planted immediately.
Growing tulips in pots on the windowsill is based on creating conditions,close to the natural growth of plants. The cooling of the bulbs requires special attention, since in the wild the formation of shoots and flowers occurs after they have passed the stage of winter dormancy. Growing tulips at home allows you to have flowers at any time of the year, even in winter.
Home landing
You can plant tulips at the end of the first month of autumn:
- First you need to prepare pots 15 cm high and soil. Sod land, river sand, humus and a little ash are taken in a ratio of 1:2:1.
- The bulbs are inspected, diseased, damaged, and treated with potassium permanganate.
- Drainage, such as sphagnum moss, is placed at the bottom of the pot. After that, the container is filled with prepared soil.
- The bulbs are laid out on its surface at a distance of a centimeter from one another.
- Then the planting material is covered with earth to the very tops.
- The plantings are watered, and if the tops are not closed, the substrate is topped up.
- The pots are placed in a room with a temperature above +9 ° C and a humidity of 80%, it should be dark in it.
Home flower care
Growing tulips in winter is different in that the flower needs to be provided with additional lighting for 10 hours a day, otherwise the stems will stretch, the color of the petals and leaves will become much paler. To prolong the flowering period, flower pots are taken out to the balcony at night, and the leaves are sprayed during the day. When caring for home tulips, some subtleties should be observed:
- Don't put them in bright sun.
- Protect from drafts.
- Keep pots at a decent distance from heat sources.
- Wash with settled water at room temperature.
- Cut the flowers at the very base of the plant. Do it early in the morning.
How to save seedlings?
Tulip bulbs must be grown and stored in favorable conditions. If there are few bulbs, they are stored in low boxes, the bottom of which is made of mesh. This is necessary for good ventilation so that rot does not start. They spread the bulbs in one layer, put the boxes one on top of the other.
In plants after the winter period, when they were at rest, nutrients accumulate, due to which flower buds are laid and formed. Therefore, for successful growth, tulips need to provide a decrease in temperature artificially, but this must be done gradually:
- For the first month after harvesting, the bulbs are kept in a room with an air temperature of 20 ° C, it should be dark and dry.
- When the end of summer comes, the temperature is reduced to 17°C for up to 14 days.
- September, October and November storage of bulbs is carried out at a temperature of five to nine degrees Celsius. A cellar or refrigerator is suitable for this.
It should be remembered that some fruits and vegetables tend to release ethylene during storage, which is harmful to tulips. For this reason, they are recommended to keepaway from apples, tomatoes, pears, melons, plums, bananas. These are just the fruits that secrete an unwanted substance.
